Rick Jacobus says if you didn’t get signed up and want to go to the Freedom Week event, just call Rick, you MIGHT be able to go. If you signed up and don’t show up, you will get charged so let Rick know if you can’t make it. It was mentioned that you need to use Sheridan Blvd., West on Quincy to gain access to Pine Hurst C.C. Check-in is 10:45-11:15 and the banquet is at 11:30am.

Mr. McKim reminds us that the Poker Tournament is 3 weeks away. He has Poker tickets to hand out for donations…..$65/per ticket There will be about a $5,000 prize pool and may be higher. Cash or checks made out to Arapahoe Sertoma. Several members have donated prizes. 2nd Annual Charity Poker Tournament.png

Will Martinez has King Soopers coupons. The club receives 5% but only 4 people regularly use the service. The card is like a debit card so it’s easy to use.

Mike Magee has set up a tour of Invesco Field April 22nd at 2:00 pm.

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SERTOMAN OF THE DAY:

Suffering from some kind of bug, Don Smith gave a somewhat shorter run down on his life. He was born in Milwaukee, Wisconsin in 1946. His parents were both Colorado natives and were transferred back to the Denver area six months later.

Don was a paperboy for the Rocky Mountain News, starting at age 12. He spent one year at East High in Denver, then the family moved to Littleton. He went to Littleton High for a year and a half before getting kicked out, and then went into the Navy. He served for 3 ½ years, in before 18, out before 21. “Kiddy cruiser.” His ship was home based in San Diego and it was the USS Iwo Jima LPH-2, a landing platform for helicopters. It was the ship that later picked up the astronauts from Apollo 13. Don did set foot on Vietnam soil, for a one day beach party. He was a radioman and a teletype machine operator. He went to Vietnam twice and on the third trip over, he was discharged. The object of the helicopters was to carry the Marines behind enemy lines.

After the Navy tour, Don went to work in Southern California as an assembly line worker for a company that made metal desks, then Orange County Communications and then for a rock, sand and gravel company. Due to back pain from an automobile accident 3 years earlier, he packed up the family and moved to NE were he did land leveling for a couple years before going to tech school to learn electronics. After school, he worked for King Radio in KS.

Don started working for the railroads in 1980 when he hired in with the ATSF in Emporia, KS. In 1984, he transferred to Pueblo and worked there until his job was abolished. He ended up quitting the Santa Fe and worked briefly at CFI Steel Mill in Pueblo, then with the D&RGW RR. In 1993, he was laid off and 4 months later, was hired by the BN (BNSF) in Denver and has been there ever since..
Mike Ballew brought him into the club about 11 years ago.

Willie, Mickey and the Duke are represented. So are the Iron Horse, the Babe, the Big Train and the Georgia Peach. Oh, and let's not forget Campy, Joe D. and Hammerin' Hank. There's no beginning, middle or end to Marshall Fogel's baseball memorabilia collection. Everywhere you look, the history keeps pouring out.

Oh, and the bats and gloves. For as far as you can see, the bats and gloves. There are game-used bats from virtually every Hall of Famer, and gloves that date to 1905.

There are two places you can view the evolution of the catcher's mitt from the early days of the 20th century — Cooperstown and Fogel's collection at his Denver home.

"The reason I collected bats early on is because I wanted something they used. And what's more important than a bat?" said Fogel, a Denver attorney who began collecting in 1989. "When people look at their batting averages, that's what made them. It's the same thing with gloves. It becomes a personal thing to them."

Among the gloves in Fogel's collection are those once worn by Warren Spahn, Roy Campanella and Eddie Mathews. Then there are the names from a more recent time — Willie Mays, Henry Aaron and Pete Rose. And, of course, there's a who's who of contemporary superstars, including Roger Clemens, Alex Rodriguez and Greg Maddux.

With each one, there's a story.

The crown jewel, in Fogel's eyes, is Campanella's catcher's mitt, a gift to a kid at Ebbets Field before the car accident that left the three-time MVP paralyzed.

There's also a prototype of Babe Ruth's glove from the 1920s, which is barely bigger than a 21st-century batting glove.

"He made a lot of errors, and you can see why," Fogel said. "All of them did during that era."

You want a glove story? Check out Mathews' mitt. It isn't even an Eddie Mathews model. And it isn't an infielder's glove, either. Though Mathews played third, he wore a Roy Sievers model for much of his career. Sievers was an outfielder who won the 1949 American League rookie of the year award with the long lost St. Louis Browns.

Not all of the gloves in Fogel's collection are in pristine condition. When it comes to gloves, older is better. Take the case of Rose's glove, from his days as an infielder with the Cincinnati Reds. Its battered condition stands in stark contrast to Rose's appearance in photographs in Fogel's collection.

"He was always very meticulous about his uniform," Fogel said. "He always had everything perfectly clean. But he would wear his glove 'til it just wore out. He loved his glove."

So did Mays and Aaron, whose McGregor gloves were made by a company that no longer exists.

"Having a glove worn by Mays is really special," he said. "All around, there wasn't anything he couldn't do."

Not every glove in Fogel's collection is weathered and worn. Clemens' is in mint condition. In fact, given the words embroidered on its side — "Roger Clemens, Opening Day 1989" — it may have been worn only once before being sold. That's typical of today's megastars, who don't throw away their used equipment like the players of yesteryear did.

"They all have reps now," Fogel said. "They have their own companies they give their equipment to and they make

And to think Fogel got into collecting as a hobby. To this day, he appreciates those moments when he's alone with all that history. And what does he often do in those moments? What else? He grabs a glove and starts pounding the palm with his fist.

"I do it all the time," he said. "You know what it is? It brings the little boy out in you. It makes me think of Mickey Mantle. No matter what he did with his drinking and family life, everybody from my generation wanted to be Mickey Mantle when they were a kid.

"What could be greater than that? You come from Commerce, Okla., you're a handsome guy and you're a New York Yankee. Think about it. He lived out everyone's dream." (Jim Armstrong@denverpost.com)

You can Google Marshall's name and get lots of information. Listen to his talk: Marshall Fogel.mp3